


i knew thee, death.

by cicaronis



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: "fix" it, "happy", Angst, Artistic Liberties, Delusions, Flashbacks, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Inspired by Poetry, M/M, Mind Palace, POV Will Graham, Pining, Post-Canon Fix-It, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Post-Fall (Hannibal), Protective Hannibal Lecter, Sad with a Happy Ending, Someone Help Will Graham, Unreliable Narrator, Will Graham Loves Hannibal Lecter, accidental happy ending, e.e. cummings - Freeform, not enough fics have sad will, rip hannibal, so he goes a bit mad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-21
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:01:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26005357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cicaronis/pseuds/cicaronis
Summary: will graham faces the consequences of his actions.or the fall goes desperately wrong and hannibal dies, while will survives (i know this has been done before, but it's such a good trope).
Relationships: Alana Bloom & Will Graham, Will Graham & Hannibal Lecter, Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 11
Kudos: 49





	1. [i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart)]

**Author's Note:**

> i love hannibal, but i love a broken, yearning will even more. 
> 
> so many unapologetic e.e. cummings references and quotes in ().
> 
> cummings quotes really lend themselves towards the internal dialogue of someone slowly losing it and i adore that.

I awoke in a hospital, you weren't there.

They told me I was lucky, that I hadn't taken much damage at all (they did not say who absorbed the damage in my stead, they did not mention you at all).

I thought you might hate me, I was terrified of seeing you, the dread was overwhelming to the point that I could think of nothing else.

The realisation dawned on me that I had failed, dramatically and irreversibly (we had survived _and_ we had been apprehended). you would not allow me a (second) second chance. I was well and truly fucked.

This, of course, was wishful thinking.

The sheer naiveté, believing that the worst possible outcome would have been you feeling a bit cross ( _"c'est le meilleur des mondes possibles"_ , you would say, perfectly blasé, if I mentioned this to you. (I do not know if you truly believe this, but the words have passed through your lips so many times that I have memorised each syllable, despite, admittedly, knowing little French).

When I asked for you, they walked me past each room, and really, I knew then (they could not look me in the eye), but hope is resilient and until they pushed open the door to the morgue and pulled back the sheet, I fully believed(when you died, i died with you) you were still with me.

I simply assumed that the laws of physics or humanity or whatever it is that governs this world would follow the narrative that we had arbitrarily established. That there could be no you sans me, and certainly, I could never be without you. We were connected, conjoined, as it were.

Even when, in a haze of love and uncertainty and fear, I initiated the fall, I can't pretend that I believed I could kill you.

You always seemed... _above_ death. Having mastered it, it could have no hold over you.

Yet, there you were. cold and so _lifeless_.

The myriads of bodies I have seen, the deaths I have laid witness to, the lives I have _taken_ , god, all of it, all of it can be so easily equated to nothing.

Acceptable losses, nameless victims, it doesn't matter. Replaceable, they were all replaceable. Their families would mourn, but the world at large would not even notice their departure, their lives like errant particulate in the wind, entirely inconsequential.

But there will never be another you, the sun will never shine as bright, the stars fast become lacklustre, their vibrancy rendered dull by the sheer absence of you, you were everything, everything. 

How could I have been so foolish? So arrogant as to remove you from the world? Like ancient religious leaders dismissing a heliocentric universe(you were brilliantly much brighter than the sun), I dared to dream that life would go on without you, without us.

But staring at your remnants, at the terrifying lack of all that you once consisted of now laid out onto a pristine autopsy table, I felt a sensation equatable to vertigo. 

The earth, hurtling through space at an incomprehensible speed, had all at once stopped turning. And I, only I, could sense it. I heard the sea rushing into my ears, drowning me, filling each crevice, all the cracks of my being that you had once occupied, like gold from a kintsugi piece, golden you completing, bettering, idealising the shattered teacup that was now (irreversibly, i will never recover from so devastating a blow) shards upon a hospital floor. God, _what have I done ?_

You were always so vivid, resplendent, alive. Every centimetre of you vibrating with life, you had this joie de vivre, this essence about you, an exuberance. Always clad in a mask, but that aspect of you wasn't a front. You treated life as if it was a most enjoyable treat, imbibing it like the most exquisite wine. 

_I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so sorry, I am so_

lost without you.

The roar in my head is excruciating, I cannot breathe, I am immobile. _finally_ , I think, it is happening. I am dying, as I said, I cannot live without you. I have breathed you in like oxygen, you are an essential element, not a mere fancy, a superfluous indulgence, I _need_ you, god, I am nothing without you, I 

am suddenly aware that I am not alone (but I am alone, I was alone before I met you and there will never be another you I was so lucky so blessed you

are not there, just a shell.

Jack is walking up behind me, clapping me on the back, he is smiling.

He is _smiling_.

"That sick son of a bitch had it coming, I'm just glad you managed to get the job done and come out the other side." says (the insufferable prick I once called) my good friend.

As if I have done the world a favour, saved it, somehow. As if I have not robbed the universe of the only beautiful creature it ever managed to produce.

I could kill him for it.

Instead, I stare at him, stare past him, searching for something, finding nothing, abandoning interest. He is saying _something_ , but I can't hear anything but the sea, the wind, the rushing of blood, your voice saying "this is all I ever wanted for you", mine replying, mine lying, not lying, I wasn't lying, it _was_ beautiful, incomprehensibly, horrifyingly beautiful and I wanted nothing more than to revel in it, worship the moment, worship you, but it was too much, it was everything I had spent my whole life (dreaming of) avoiding and I, like a coward, was scared. 

"Will?"

Jack is worried, let him worry, let him doubt, but do not let him think that I am happy you are gone. there is no need for pretences, there will never be a need for them again. I cannot free you from the arms of death, and he cannot take you from me.

(anything that is done by only you is my doing (Jack does not understand this (all your crimes are mine, too).

"Will!"

The hand on my shoulder returns, grasping firmer now, words directed at me, garbled, it doesn't matter, it isn't you, why won't you stand up? Why are you just lying on the table while I shake while I cry while I(half drunk on pain and the ocean's own agony) die.

God, it's so much worse when you're not here, the hand cupping my face is not yours, the fingers digging into my skin, not yours, the voices whispering, yelling, pleading, are not yours.

The blood clouding my vision is not yours, (but it might as well be, for you are whatever I have always been, and whatever I will always be is you)

And the stars( _fall from the sky, angels committing celestial suicide, envying and lamenting you and i_ ), no, the _scars_ on my face are reopening and the blood is pouring down my face and the hands on my face are not Jack's, not yours, not anyone's, and the jagged nails ripping into my skin must be mine, must be mine, must be my hands tearing the hair from my head, must be my blood, my tears, my screams, mine, mine, mine, when it used to be ours, but it never will be again

and it feels like a seizure, (not mild)

and I feel myself losing

(you)

consciousness.

* * *

When I wake, I am strapped to a bed. 

I feel numb.

My fingers(paler be they than daunting death) are saturated with blood (my blood, yours, ours)

(stark red in a purely white untouched pristine painted room(I smile wine-red blood soaking teeth white purely contaminated)

and I close my eyes.

* * *

When the gods rip me from my blessed respite and I am forced into awareness (I'd rather fade, find you in a dream in a memory (kiss me)

Alana is sat by my bedside, quietly regarding me (professional curiosity).

She mentions that they'll cremate you (they fear you'd be vandalised, otherwise (but I don't think they care).

I ask to see you, she says it's not a good idea.

She looks _oh_ , so sad,

like the curse of Atlas has been passed to her and the weight of the sky rests solely on her shoulders.

She isn't happy, so I listen to her.

* * *

When she leaves, with a heartache and a heaviness so palpable I cannot clearly see through it (she is, despite her best interest, mourning you-me-us and I love her for it), I pick the shoddy handcuffs they bound me with

and go to you

alone.

Finding where they put you was hard and I briefly considered that perhaps they'd done away with you, returned you to ashes before I could say goodbye (I will never say goodbye, I can never be without you, wherever I am, you are, my darling)

But, _oh_ , there you were.

Regal, even in death. 

There's a scent about you, like secondary school science labs, a dissection.

I nearly vomit. 

They have humiliated you, condescended you, touched you, defiled you, how _dare_ they touch

my love and life and heart (your heart is gone, they took it, mine is lying on a table and it smells of preservatives and not of expensive colognes with names in languages you promised(you _always_ keep your promises, you said, (i asked you to promise that you would never leave me, the silence was unbroken) you would one day teach me).

_"I'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorrypleasecomebacktomeIneedyouIcannotexistapartfromyouIwillnotsurviveseparationcomebackI'msorry-"_

I say,

and the words spill from my lips like something sweet, a prayer

and my voice is something I do not recognise 

(your name is trapped behind my teeth, i cannot say it (if i say it, you will surely die(they say one has two deaths, firstly when you stop breathing and secondly when the last person who has known you(loved you) utters your name one final time)

and I reach for you, trailing my fingers across

( _i think of you the holy city which is your face your cheekbones the streets of smiles your eyes half- thrush half-angel and your drowsy lips where float flowers of kiss_ )

the only part of you they _(I)_ didn't destroy

your face.

It's not the way they say, you don't look as though you've simply fallen asleep,

you look... _emptied_ of yourself,

as if you're somewhere else, somewhere I cannot reach you (somewhere I have never travelled, far beyond any experience, (you were lost in the sea, what they dragged to the hospital is something else entirely).

and I curl my fingers in your hair

and it's cold and you're cold and you've never been cold to the touch you've always been warm as if the fire inside reverberated and spilled throughout your body, lighting you up like a candle or a flare (I was drawn to you, of course, moth to the flame, I was burnt, but oh, what a beautiful flame)

and I'm scared 

so I grasp your (my, our) hand because it's the only thing in the world that has ever made sense

and for one blissful second everything feels right again, but your hand is cold and you aren't returning the gesture, I am still spinning through space (my gravity is lying on a table and it is cold and I need to hold on to you but you are not holding on to me and I let go because I'm not strong enough to hold on (when we fell off the cliff (when I took us off the cliff ( _when I killed you_ , you held on to me like I was a precious thing, the only precious thing, you dug your nails into my back, you left marks, they say it will scar, ( _thank god it will scar_ , I have to remember(but how could I ever forget) you curled your hands into my back like a baby, _like a baby,_ you held on to me like I was the only thing that mattered, I don't remember the fall, I just remember the way your arms felt wrapped, to the point of suffocation, around me, you did not let go, you kissed my hair, you protected me (I killed you).

the concept of leaving you, of living without you

is laughable.

When they come for me, with you I should be, in death, like I planned (but you died protecting me (Alana told me this as if I did not remember as if I could forget as if I could pretend the water blurred the sound of your spine breaking instead of mine as if I could forget the way your body curled around mine as if I could forget your hands slipping from my sides as if I could pretend that you simply chose to let go as if I didn't feel your heart stop beating as if mine didn't stop with it).

* * *

Minutes or days or hours or years later, they find me.

(I am still holding your hand, I have warmed it.)

I cannot be here, they say.

I feel like crying, _where else could I go_?

(the water felt like an apology, you didn't let me drown, the waves crashed against us, but you held me terribly tightly _(no one, not even the sea has such strong hands)_.

Where else can I go, please someone tell me, _where else can I go_?

They are trying to take you away from me, how can I let them? 

All I can ever do for you

is _fall_

and so I fall

and I(your warm hand now part of me, intensely and half-broken I) take you with me, as I so often do

(like a baby bird from a tree is taught how to fly)

* * *

I wake to find myself in another secured bed.

(it has been years or hours, each second apart from you is an eternity)

different hospital (they took me from you, as if the unforgiving death which ate you up was not distance enough).

Alana is there, so is Jack.

He doesn't understand, he wears his confusion like an ill fitting suit.

I can't be bothered to explain

(I loved _(hated-despised-desired)_ you)

(I wanted to run away (anywhere with you is home)I can't live without you).

Alana is holding something, it's small (a box, I can see, containing you, I know)

there is dread building up in my stomach and bile climbing up my throat,

they share a look and Jack retreats from the room without meeting my eyes (he cannot meet my eyes, they are pale fully death-touched abysses (you are hiding in them).

I feel like screaming (there is iron on my tongue, it tastes like justice).

Alana rests her hand on my own, it is warm, it is not yours.

"I'm so sorry, Will."

Why is she sorry? I can't breathe, I have to see you, have to see you, please they have to let me see you, they can't take you from me.

"Jack told me not to give this to you, but it's the least I could do."

She hands me the item. It's ever so small, oh, god, please no. 

" _Memento mori_ ", she murmured with a nearly imperceptible sigh

"I thought he might approve."

You would have, too. the box revealed a locket of a sort, Victorian, elegant, and undoubtedly expensive. 

In its three compartments, it contained what appeared to be a lock of hair, a smattering of ashes, and somehow most painful of all, a picture.

It was sweet of her, really,

and so I felt bad when my hands started shaking, and it fell to my side as I closed my eyes and trembled. 

This was all that was left of you (this is the passing of all shining things(my sun has faded).

My darling, my darling, my life and my pride.

You, of royal blood, seemingly untouchable, now reduced to sentimental ephemera. 

It was disgraceful to reduce you to such things, you deserved to become _art_ (though you always have been art, you might have been an ancient sculpture breathed life into, or an escaped god from a renaissance painting), it would have been your design.

This, this is all wrong. 

This isn't you, but it's all I have. All I'll ever have.

And I lift it to my nose and it smells like you, or at least like your exorbitantly priced colognes and somehow it's the most beautiful fragrance that has ever graced my senses. I can almost forget that awful chemical odour from before, almost. 

And suddenly, Alana's crying, too (you meant to kill her and still she grieves, so intoxicating are you).

It's easy to forget that she loved you once, as well (that's the funny thing about love, isn't it? it never quite leaves and it never makes sense).

And I start to laugh, because my eyes are red with tears and my throat is raw from screaming (I don't remember screaming, just the pain of searing loss becoming overwhelming as I wept) and the laughter isn't humourless, as I think of how pleased you would be to have us lament over your loss so intensely, for your legacy to haunt us from beyond the grave (you do not have a grave, Alana tells me. I can never visit you, but then, a cemetery would be too plebeian for you, regardless).

Alana does not join me, her red rimmed eyes can't find the comedy in this, and that's okay, too, but I feel that I may never laugh again.

And I close my eyes and I close my eyes and my eyes are closed and the sea descends on and from them, beautifully salt-ridden oceans wrenched from my no longer laughing eyes and as merciful sleep drifts over me, I feel with rising certainty that whenever I wake, it will be far too soon.


	2. all that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> mind palace will! just my interpretation, but i really like this concept.
> 
> happier chapter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> he's meant to have gone a bit mad in this, but it's mostly grief and dissociating.
> 
> i cannot oversell the power of listening to hindenburg lover by anton seabra while reading this, it's incomprehensible. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6f3Qqj_Bto

there are roses filling my hospital room (in a long uninterrupted reverie)

only roses, no tulips, no daisies, no moonflowers, just roses.

my visitors are flowers, too (they will never let me leave this place)

and they try to speak to me, but i have forgotten the language of the flowers.

i can barely understand the trees (for the trees are whispering from the windows, they murmur with the wind, it's easier to comprehend).

and alana (rose) cries floral scented tears and screams something about fertiliser and the lack of sunlight in paris until jack (rose) pulls her into thorny arms (they do not bleed) and comforts her with talk of bees and pollination. 

I'm only guessing, really, i no longer speak the language of the flowers (i no longer wish to)

and the trees are often whispering too quietly to hear.

the doctors (roses) shake their heads with little frowns on petal faces and ask me questions i do not understand. 

you brought me roses (red) once

you never visit(in these dreams (i have night terrors, waking in pools of sweat (dreaming that you've died).

i ask the roses about you, but they don't understand.

this is all a dream, anyway, i know this.

still, when i wake into a new land, and you take my hand (your hands are like fire, it hurts to touch, but the pain is bearable compared to the dreams i have (where the roses sometimes speak clearly and tell me you've died), i feel an inexplicable relief.

you will (kiss me) go 

up into the forests to gather berries, (kiss me) i will go

down into the rivers and the rivers cough up fish for dinner (the waters are kind to me, there's a undercurrent of guilt, as if they are making up for some unimaginable cruelty (i do not know what it is they think they have done).

you (kiss me) call to me and i leave the waters to (kiss you) sit amidst the flowers (wildflowers) and feed you wild raspberries and when i kiss your stained lips, you run your hands through my hair (touching skilfully, mysteriously) and i can't help but close my eyes-

and open them (in a dream) to screaming roses.

* * *

molly (rose) is in this one. she is silent, reflective, sitting by the bed of my hospital room (dream) 

"i forgive you." she dares to whisper.

"i don't know if you can hear me, but i do forgive you, Will. i doubt if i'll ever understand why you did what you did, and part of me hopes i never have to see you again, but i loved you, and love makes us a bit mad, doesn't it?" she (rose) continues, with a definitive wilt to her petals. 

it's a dream, i know, but it hurts nonetheless. i want to wake up.

"you'd know." she mutters with a distinctly humourless laugh.

i want to forget the language of the flowers.

she gets up to leave, hesitates at the door, and repeats, "I forgive you."

seemingly, more to convince herself than to alleviate any perceived guilt I might have been harbouring.

the dream lasts a while longer, roses enter and depart the room, i ignore them, I want to wake up, I want to see you.

* * *

you gently shake my shoulder, i abandon the dream immediately, you notice my tears, you do not ask. you gather me into your arms and when my sobs subside, i tell you. 

it rushes from me like howling wind through a gaping hole, and you listen (i have never told anyone these things)

i speak of my father (lily of the valley), of molly (rose), and of everything. 

you listen and you _understand,_ you kiss the tears as they fall from my eyes (later, you confess that my tears are sweet, as if i've cried through my salt reserves and all that remains is sugar) you say not a word, you only gaze at me with love and understanding as i (budding flower opening so easily under the warmth of your sunlight) tell you of everything that has ever hurt me (i do not know what it is about you that closes and opens;only something in me understands the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses).

"you will never have to sleep again", you whisper into my hair, kissing it softly. 

and i believe you.

* * *

as the stars crawl up into the sky, we hold on to each other, tightly(you are clutching my arms (terribly tightly and if your grasp( _whitely knuckled grip fingers piercing through my arm (i cannot say where you end and i begin)_ is like a child's grasp, desperate and pleading (please don't leave me) i do not let you go.

somewhere, far off in a dream, i am falling, but it doesn't matter, we are far from the dreamlands, in our own little world.

i will never sleep again, and if i fall, you will catch me.

there is a darkness creeping into my vision, and i am suddenly frightened,

for past your form, i can see

death's faultless eyes, searching, peering

you reach for me, with a sad sort of smile, and tell me ( _only look at me, my darling_ ) 

i take your hand (warm, though mine is cooling quickly) and pull you towards me, laying my head on your chest.

in a dream, i hear roses screaming, someone's jumped.

you stroke my hair, you tell me ( _only listen to my voice, my dear_ )

i am cold, shivering, shaking, but you grasp my shoulders (terribly tightly, it will leave marks)

and you kiss me (darkness and beauty of stars was on my mouth (petals danced 

against my eyes) and all i felt was you

i gasped and heard a million voices, roses, trees, and you(it was always you, my heart)

i buried my face in your chest, i listened to the beat of your heart (there was no sound)

i drew in one last breath (you were whispering sweet nothings in all the languages you had once promised to teach me, each word was clear, i am _yours_ ) and the trembling subsided, the voices faded (all but yours), and over your shoulder, the eyes turned away (i had conquered beautifully all the roses(i knew thee, death.)

you drew a shuddering breath (you do not cry) and look down at me, with something akin to wonderment in your eyes.

"Let us go then, you and I, when the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherized upon a table;" i think of these words and you murmur them against my skin.

hands intertwined, we walk towards the stars (where we are headed, i cannot say, i do not need to know(somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond any experience.)

* * *

(Our feet tread sleepless meadows sweet with fear(and i cannot help but smile).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm assuming that he(will(in a dream) jumped off the roof of the hospital. 
> 
> what's the dream, what's reality? depends on how sad you want to be!

**Author's Note:**

> i don't own any of the e.e. cummings' bits, but they're public domain, if you want to know if a certain line is from a poem, leave a comment and i'll tell you!
> 
> also, poor will.


End file.
